


Rules of Engagement

by T-Rex (tmishkin)



Series: The Adventures of Gus & John [1]
Category: Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Ethical Dilemmas, Jewish Augustine Little, M/M, War is hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:15:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28326669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tmishkin/pseuds/T-Rex
Summary: chapter 13, Victory of Eagles“There will be no quarter given,” Laurence said. There was a heavy finality to his tone, who somehow warded off any other questions; the captains did not say anything, even to one another."Killing soldiers," Laurence said at last, "most of whom are starving; and making them vicious, so they give us still-better excuse."“Rules of Engagement” was inspired by consumptive_sphinx's fic “l'chaim," which features a Jewish Augustine Little. I thought the brutal campaign against the French irregulars would be a good time for Little and Granby to become, er, more engaged. What was I thinking.
Relationships: John Granby/Augustine Little
Series: The Adventures of Gus & John [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2157219
Comments: 22
Kudos: 16





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CMOTScribbler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CMOTScribbler/gifts).
  * Inspired by [l'chaim](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10619400) by [consumptive_sphinx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/consumptive_sphinx/pseuds/consumptive_sphinx). 



Edinburgh and Points South

Augustine Little walked slowly back to the tent he was sharing with Granby, trying to imagine fighting foot soldiers armed only with muskets without accepting any man’s surrender. Why, they would have to kill them where they stood! Could he do that? Could he ask that of Immortalis? 

He lifted the tent flap and ducked inside. Granby was already sitting on a camp chair, head in his hands. “I cannot believe Laurence has accepted these orders,” Granby said. “It’s not right to set dragons on men!” 

Little sighed and slumped on his cot. “I know. Laurence has allowed Wellington to point all responsibility to him and none to us, yet our hands will be equally bloody.” 

“Perhaps the French will run away,” Granby said. “They are irregulars, after all, and it’s not difficult to hide in the forest.” 

“If I saw Iskierka dropping from the heights shooting gouts of flame, I’d be hard put not to run,” Little admitted. 

It was January in the year 1808. The cold beat at the men from outside the tent and inside their hearts. Wrapped in blankets, they lay on their cots and shivered, waiting for the light. 

%%%

Two mornings later saw them in position. They had flown but half an hour when they saw the smoke: the French had raided a village a few miles from Gretna Green. Outside the village, two bodies lay in the road, bayonet wounds in their stomachs and chests. One was still moving a bit. 

Little felt his gut clench. The Frenchmen had not even bothered with a coup de grace for the villagers. As they came over the next hill, he saw the French troops and Laurence’s ensign signaled the attack. 

At dinner that night he huddled with Granby, who was closest to him in age and temperament, though Little had grown up with Chenery. 

“What do you think?” Little asked softly. 

“Of that?” Granby snorted. “I can hardly call it a battle. Five minutes and they were dead or fled, the bloody bastards. Iskierka liked it well enough.” 

“They killed the villagers who resisted and stole enough food to starve the rest before spring should come, but when I saw the terror on their faces…” 

“I know. It’s a wretched thing to do in service of our country.” Granby stood. “I’m turning in soon. No point staying awake in the dark.” 

“I’ll be in shortly. Do you want to push the cots together? It’ll be warmer.” 

“Good idea.” 

%%%

The trouble with January in the north—besides the bitter cold—was the long nights. The sun was scarcely up for seven hours a day. Little slept for five hours and woke to the middle of the night. He lay there thinking, curled with his back to Granby, who was reliably warm, didn’t steal the blankets, and snored only softly. An excellent bedfellow all around and a good friend. 

But only Chenery knew that Augustine Little was not his real name. 

And only in the middle of long nights like these did Chaim Leibowitz permit himself to think of his family and his name. 

Born to a shop-keeping family in London, he had left home at ten to fly with the dragons, taking a name that sounded Christian to him. The nation’s laws forbade a Jew or Catholic from serving as an officer in His Majesty’s Armed Forces, so if he was leaving his old life behind, why not go all the way, leave his identity too, in the hope of one day becoming a dragon captain? 

He had never been called to the Torah. He had not said the Shema in fifteen years. He violated the dietary laws almost daily. The exhilaration of flying with Immortalis made it seem a fair trade, most days. 

Now, as he lay awake, the words of his childhood came to him. V’ahavta et re’echa k’mocha—love your neighbor as yourself. Is a French soldier my neighbor? Lo tirtzach. Do not kill. Is all killing wrong? He had spent only a few years in the schoolroom with the other boys, only a few more in the arms of his extended family. We were strangers in the land of Egypt. Love the stranger. The widow and orphan. Did God expect him to see the Frenchman who had just stabbed an English farmer as his neighbor? 

It seemed like hours until sleep came again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many medieval European countries officially expelled their Jewish residents, starting with England in 1290. After the expulsion, there was no overt Jewish community (as opposed to individuals practicing Judaism secretly) until the rule of Oliver Cromwell. While Cromwell never officially readmitted Jews to the Commonwealth of England, a small colony of Sephardic Jews living in London was identified in 1656 and allowed to remain. While England had been virulently anti-Semitic in medieval times (before and after the Edict of Expulsion), in the mid to late 19th century it acquired a reputation for religious tolerance and attracted significant immigration from Eastern Europe (Wikipedia series, History of the Jews in England).
> 
> Lo tirtzach (Exodus 20:13) is often translated as “You shall not kill,” but it means “You shall not murder.” Kill is a completely different verb. Jewish scholars have interpreted the brief and often-cryptic statements in the Torah for hundreds of years, expanding them into an entire code of law, the Talmud. Little|Leibowitz left home before he could study any of the details and complexities, so he has to puzzle through the ethical dilemmas from what he remembers and what he has experienced.


	2. Chapter 2

Every day was a little harder, a little easier. Harder to believe that what they were doing was justifiable. Easier to feel that killing was a mechanical task, like turning a wheel to grind corn into meal. Except for the voice in Little’s head that whispered, “What you are grinding is your own soul.” 

The French soldiers contributed to his ethical quandary by stepping up the viciousness of their attacks. At Howick Hall, they raped several women in the church where they had taken refuge and killed the elderly vicar and two boys who tried to stop them. 

“Where does it end?” Little asked Granby over supper that night. “They steal food. We kill them. They set fire to the villages. We slaughter more of them. They assault women and murder those who defend them. We hunt them down and grind them into the mud. You should have seen Sutton today. Laurence sent us to bring provisions from the house to the village, but when Messoria spotted some stragglers, Sutton veered off and shot them, then bayonetted them for good measure. Said they were just getting what they deserved.” 

“Oh,” said Granby, faintly. “I must try again to speak to Laurence. We are destroying ourselves along with them. Today I saw young Roland weeping and swearing, wishing her mother were here to sort things out. What good is winning if we lose what makes us human?” 

%%%

Little sat by the fire after supper, drinking watered whiskey and trying not to think. After a while, Granby stalked over and threw himself down next to Little. It seemed his talk with Laurence hadn’t gone well at all. 

Granby scowled. “He said, in that damned voice of his, ‘Captain Granby, I hope you know that you may transfer to another station, at any time you wish: I would not keep anyone at this task against his will’.” 

“I told him he could go fuck himself.” 

Little’s jaw dropped. “Here,” he said roughly, passing Granby his cup, “You need this more than I do.” 

Granby took a few sips, then handed the cup back to Little. They hunched together in silence, shoulders touching. Around the fires, the other aviators were huddled in twos and threes, seeking warmth and comfort. Nobody spoke above a whisper. 

Little finished his drink. “I’m going to check on Immortalis and take a piss,” he said. “Don’t stay out here too long.” 

He had just started to warm up under the blankets when Granby came in, yanked off his boots, and threw himself onto the cot. Little grunted and pushed the blankets over Granby. Sure enough, he was shivering. “Come here,” said Little, rolling over and pulling Granby’s back against his chest. “I can’t sleep if your teeth are rattling.” 

Sleeping back to back was the accepted practice, but spooning was much warmer, though it carried certain risks. Not now, however. His cock hadn’t so much as twitched since they ran down the first of Napoleon’s irregulars. 

%%%

Two days later, word came that several French dragons had been sent out to forage for themselves, proof that Laurence’s party had made serious inroads into the invaders’ supply chain. They lost no time finding two Petit Chevaliers who had landed at a dairy farm and were three cows into what was likely their first good meal in days. 

Maximus landed atop one of them even as she tried to take flight, and his immense weight crushed her. He staggered off, shaken by the impact, but his opponent did not rise again. Meanwhile, Iskierka raked the other Chevalier’s chest and wing with flame as his captain ran towards them from the dairy-house, shouting his surrender. 

Immortalis, Messoria, and Iskierka moved to surround the injured dragon. Little sucked in a breath. It had been a quick and violent assault. What would Laurence do, order them to kill the injured dragon? And his captain—would they shoot him where he stood waving his white handkerchief? 

“Please, God, no,” he thought. “Enough blood has been shed.” 

Laurence was frowning. 

“Laurence,” Little said. He tried to shout, but it came out as a whisper. “Laurence, no.” 

Laurence turned to his signal ensign, decisive once again, giving orders to take the dragon and his captain into custody. 

Little saw Granby looking at him and blew out his breath in an exaggerated gesture of relief, then slumped forward, exhausted. 


	3. Chapter 3

Little hoped that taking prisoners would now be their modus operandi, but he was wrong. The killing continued—and in fact got worse. Shortly after the dairy farm incident, some three or four weeks into their mission, the French began to pull back their dragons from the northern countryside for lack of food, which left their infantry vulnerable to attack from above. 

And attack they did, sometimes killing as many as fifty Frenchmen a day and routing many more, who were forced to abandon what little supply and equipment they had. The British aviators’ coats were all spattered with dried blood, or worse. Those who could shave mostly did not, nor did they bathe with anything resembling their former frequency. Two of the riflemen had to be left in camp, for they did nothing but sit and look at their hands all day. Maximus’s surgeon, Gaiters, said that they had the nostalgia. 

Each afternoon when they returned to camp, the French captain stared at them as though they had emerged from the gates of hell. Little could not meet his eyes. Gong Su cooked meals that were probably delicious—Temeraire was certainly raving about his skills—but Little could hardly taste a thing. The whiskey, less watered than before, slid down his throat, burning and numbing. 

Little and Granby were now sleeping spoon-fashion every night, the taller Granby curled around Little. It was the only thing that made him feel human anymore. 

%%% 

On the day that two of the lieutenants got into a fistfight over a piece of bread, Tharkay returned. 

Granby pulled Little aside, looking hopeful. “Laurence listens to him. If he speaks out against our actions, Laurence may come to his senses.” 

“I heard that he’s brought new orders from Wellington,” said Little. 

“I’m sure he has,” said Granby. “But he often has, ah, his own perspective on the matters at hand.” 

“I’m going to check on Immortalis, if you will excuse me,” said Little. It was his usual excuse when he needed to be alone, and what aviator could fault him? Immortalis was used to his captain’s random visits and understood his need for privacy: the dragon was the only living soul besides Chenery who knew that Little was Jewish, and when Little had confessed to the Yellow Reaper that he was attracted to men and not to women, Immortalis had taken that in stride as well, though his mental list of the ordinary things that humans were odd about was surely getting very long. 

Immortalis was napping with Messoria and Iskierka. Little sat down and leaned against his foreleg, closing his eyes. He wanted to pray, but he didn’t remember how. “God,” he said silently. “Help us. Help me.” Some words surfaced in his mind, the bedtime prayer his mother used to say with him. “Hashkiveinu Adonai Eloheinu l’shalom, v’ha’amideinu Malkeinu l’chaim.” Help us, God, to lie down in peace, and let us rise, Our King, to life. That was all he could remember. 

Chaim. Life. That was his name. He would fight for his country, but he would not murder for it. 

He heard Granby calling his friend Augustine Little. He forced himself back to the present and stood to meet him. 

Tharkay had apparently gotten through to Laurence. Granby was smiling, dragging Little back to the main camp with him. 

When they had all gathered, Laurence spoke. “I apologize,” he said firmly, “to all of you. There will be no more of this slaughter without quarter. Perscitia, please work with Gong Su and Lieutenant Sedder. I want a plan in place for managing prisoners by tomorrow morning. We will seek out rather than flee any force that has a gun or a few dragons. And we will fight them by the rules of engagement.” 

Granby whooped and swung Little into a rough embrace. Many of the other aviators were cheering Laurence’s announcement, though some were silent, their faces drawn. Little returned the embrace and dragged Granby off to find the whiskey, this time to celebrate. 

Everyone stayed up later than usual around the campfires. By the time Little and Granby retreated to their tent, they were not exactly drunk but certainly more inebriated than any other night on this campaign. After he pulled off his boots, Little fell back on the cots with a loud and satisfied sigh. He looked over at Granby. He had one boot off and was gazing intently at Little. Suddenly he dropped the boot and swooped down, his long arms outstretched like wings. 

“Glad tidings today!” Granby whisper-shouted at Little. “I’m going to kiss you!” 

Little’s heart raced and he threw his arms around Granby, pulling him down until their lips met. “Yes, very well, but do hush,” he said between kisses. Granby groaned and rubbed his hips against Little’s and it was fantastic and at the same time terrifying as the intimate contact reminded Little that it was very important that nobody ever saw or touched his cock. No one could know he was circumcised. 

“Oh, now, that’s enough of that!” he said hurriedly, eeling out from under Granby. Little yanked his cot and blanket away and quickly set up on the other side of the tent, his hands shaking. He slid under the blanket and turned on his side away from Granby, who he was sure was looking at him in dismay and fear. 

“I’m sorry,” Granby whispered. “I shouldn’t have . . . done that.” 

“Don’t be. You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s my fault. Go to sleep.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The term “nostalgia” was coined by a Swiss doctor in the late 1600s to refer to what we now call PTSD. This term was still being used in the late 1800s to describe traumatized soldiers. 
> 
> Regarding the prayer called Hashkiveinu, one rabbi recently wrote, “There’s something profoundly comforting about the basic human terms in which this prayer speaks. Some prayers focus on lofty themes that can feel removed from our daily lives, but Hashkiveinu gives voice to our deepest fears. We ask for God to watch over us and guard us as we sleep, enabling us to rest peacefully and wake up again in the morning restored to life.” 
> 
> While there are rumors about the British royal family all the way back to George I, circumcision was not commonly practiced by Christians in Britain until Victorian doctors promoted it as a way to reduce sexually transmitted diseases and masturbation. Due to a lack of evidence that circumcision improved health, the National Health Service stopped covering it in 1949.


	4. Chapter 4

Over the next three days, the new combat strategies worked well, but Little and Granby hardly spoke to each other. Little thought he saw Granby watching him a few times, a puzzled expression on his face. He wanted to say something: it wouldn’t do to have cheerful Granby laid low by doubt and self-recrimination. Yet he couldn’t reveal his reason for shying away from physical contact. 

What if he did? Would Granby keep quiet? Would he tell Laurence or, worse, report him to the Admiralty? Little was loath to risk losing Immortalis and his life’s work. Dear old Immortalis, who had promised to keep him safe if word of his secret identity got out. But Little had seen how vociferously Temeraire had defended Laurence against charges of treason, and how, nonetheless, Laurence had been condemned to death and Temeraire to the breeding grounds. As much as he liked Granby, Immortalis and the life he had made for himself came first. 

His fretting was interrupted by the arrival of Wellington and his command staff, who took over a barn and laid out plans for a battle, finally, with Napoleon. In less than a week, they would attempt to engage on the Essex coast, some 40 miles east of London. 

The intervening days were busy with carrying Wellesley’s forces south and east to the area near the mouth of the Thames. Little hardly saw Granby during the day. At night, it was easy to claim fatigue and avoid speaking—until the last night, when Granby whispered to him in the dark. 

“We should talk,” he said. “Tomorrow we go into battle against a superior force. We might—” 

“Yes, all right.” 

Granby dragged his cot closer to Little but didn’t touch him. “I suspect I know where the problem lies,” he said. 

Little’s breath caught in his throat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Granby’s mouth was only a few inches away. 

“I think you do.” 

“I’ve never been with a man before. I thought. . . I don’t know.” 

“It’s more than that, isn’t it?” Granby pressed. 

“No! I just. Panicked. I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t. You know I was born in Newcastle, right? Grew up poor as dirt?” 

“What’s that got to do with anything?” 

“The grocer gave my mother credit when we couldn’t pay. He was Jewish.” 

“So?” 

“I know you’re Jewish, Little. You look just like him. Stop shutting me out—I don’t care about that. Bloody hell, we’re going to fight Napoleon tomorrow, but all I can think about is you.” 

“Um,” said Little. “I think that’s my mother’s cousin. God! I should have kept my distance, but I care for you and it felt so damn good to kiss you.” 

“Kiss me again,” said Granby hoarsely. 

Little stuffed down all his fears and leaned forward, putting his hand on Granby’s shoulder. Their lips brushed, then met. 

It was a good long while before they came up for air. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The small medieval Jewish community living in Newcastle was forced to leave in 1239, decades before the Edict of Expulsion. By 1775, Jewish people had returned to Newcastle. The organized community (synagogue, cemetery) dates from 1831, by which time there were about 100 Jewish residents.
> 
> I was planning to have Little disclose his identity, but as I began to write this scene, the idea of Granby figuring it out came to me. I've always been bewildered by writers who say their characters took over or that they talk to their characters as though they were real people, but in writing this fic, I have several times made major changes in the middle of typing. Go figure.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning for brief descriptions of the violence of war

The fighting began shortly after dawn in heavy fog and drizzle. After a few hours, the fog had burned off enough that Little could occasionally catch a glimpse of Iskierka’s flame spewing from her distinctive red, green, and purple body. If Iskierka fought on, Granby was well, he told himself. 

Granby, he knew, would have a harder time spotting Immortalis. Most likely he would be looking for Lily’s formation, when he could spare a moment at all. 

At high noon, when the British dragons were exhausted from hours of fighting, the wily old French beast Accendare shot forward and unleashed a gout of flame on the other side of their formation from Little. Messoria took a direct hit, and Little tensed as she reeled in the air. He could hear Warren urging Nitidus forward to support her. 

Then Accendare’s wingdragons swooped in and boarders began jumping to Lily’s back, a dozen at once. “Maintain position!” Little shouted to his signal ensign. Lily was trying to shake off the Frenchmen before they could latch on, and the disruption allowed l’Armée de l’Air to break through their line. “Damn it!” The French dragons sped towards the British cavalry, diving low. Little could only watch as the horses began to run. 

Between Lily’s contortions and her crew’s fighting skills, the boarders were soon overwhelmed. Nitidus was helping Messoria coast to their encampment, a mile or so behind the lines, and Little could see the flags from Lily signaling them to compact their wedge formation. Dulcia moved to Immortalis’s right and Maximus pulled in behind them. 

It would take a miracle to stop the French onslaught, Little thought. The British ground troops were being forced out of position if not killed outright, yet Wellesley’s flagman still signaled Hold Fast. How much longer? What was his plan? 

The rest of the fog lifted, and Little got his first clear look at Iskierka. What on earth was she doing? She seemed to be setting fire to yards upon yards of wet fabric being carried by a dozen small dragons, who were then dropping their flaming bundles onto the neat rows of l’Armée de l’Air. The French dragons were shaking their heads vigorously as they shied from the flames. 

Suddenly the long-awaited trumpets sounded, signaling the British forces to abandon the center of the field. Lily’s small formation flew up and to the left as the French came barreling in from the right. 

Little heard the sound of multiple cannons firing from the east. As they rose above the clouds, he could see at least a dozen ships flying British colors bombarding the French troops, alone in the center of the field of combat. It was brutal. Dragons dropped from the sky. Foot soldiers and cavalry were flung aside by the blasts like rag dolls. There was smoke and the smell of burning flesh. And screaming. 

It only got worse as Wellesley’s reserves attacked from the rear of the French lines, bolstered by the Aerial Corps. Together, they pushed Napoleon’s troops into the range of the artillery on their flanks, which cut them down without mercy. Little could see Napoleon and his remaining Guard on a low hill, cut off from what remained of their reserves. Cut off from the white Celestial, Lien, and her handful of dragon attendants. 

Lien hovered another moment, gazing at Napoleon, and then shot out to sea. Running away, perhaps, or attacking the navy. Little turned back to the carnage below. Napoleon must not escape, or thousands more would die on another field of mud and blood. 


	6. Chapter 6

It was the events that one never could have imagined that were the worst, Little thought. How could one conceive of sixteen ships of the line destroyed in mere minutes by a towering wall of water? Of twenty thousand people and dozens of dragons lying dead in the mud, or washing up on the shore? Now he had seen both in a day.

Once Napoleon had flown off toward France, the fighting had ceased. Then the dreadful aftermath began. The survivors trudged the battlefield, looking for injured men and dragons who might survive being transported to the surgeons. Cloaked figures were already looting the dead and the  almost-dead . They scuttled from the survivors as though offended at the interruption. 

By six o’clock, it was already dark. Little thought that he would have dropped and slept where he was if that hadn't been a hellscape. It was strange to fly for a mile and land in a place with no bodies, with nothing to flinch from. And there. There was Granby. Alive. They fell into each other’s arms and just held on for a long moment, then staggered toward their tent.

The next day, and several after that, were dedicated to burying the dead. Liquor would have helped, but the dragon who made the fireballs,  Perscitia , had commandeered every drop of whiskey and beer in the supply wagons. As her actions might well have saved his life and many others,  Little could not begrudge her the alcohol. But the fact remained that battlefield clean-up was gruesome work, exhausting both mentally and physically. While dragons made digging graves easier, they were as stressed by it as the soldiers and aviators.

Neither Little nor Granby felt able to do more than hold each other in the dark, but that meant everything, Little thought. To not be alone when he woke from nightmares, to have someone there whom he trusted and cared for—it made healing seem possible.

%%%

Afterwards, they relocated temporarily to the covert at Dover, which was no more than forty miles away by dragon. The quarters there were not designed to house so many, and the captains had to share rooms while the lower ranks were packed four to six to a room. The dragons didn’t mind the crowding as much, and Little and Granby didn’t mind it at all. The one bed was too small for two to be comfortable, so they mostly slept on the floor, wrapped up in a tangle of blankets.

As they began to settle into a routine of drilling and patrolling the coast,  Little felt his body stirring, as if awakening from a long sleep. On the third night in Dover, he brushed his lips against Granby’s and smiled to feel his kiss returned with enthusiasm in the darkness.

The night before the battle had seen passion overlain with apprehension,  both of the coming battle and of their first time together. Now they moved more easily, kissing and rubbing together until Little thought he might come to completion from that alone, again.

“I want,” Granby said between kisses, “I want to touch you. Please.”

This they had not done. Little took his lover’s hand and guided it between his legs. “Yes,” he said. “I want you to.” He felt Granby’s hand wrap around his shaft and slide up. “Oh God,” Little said, “Oh, that’s good. Want to touch you too.” He reached out to Granby and took him in hand.

As Little slid his fingers up to the head of Granby's cock, the retracted foreskin felt like a thin ring of skin, not very noticeable, really. And much less interesting than the muffled sounds Granby was making. Little found that if he twisted his wrist at the end of each stroke, the sounds got louder.

It was difficult to make a thorough exploration of this phenomenon, however, as Granby had wrapped his hand around both of their cocks and was— oh!— stroking them together. Little added his own hand, and that was just right, so good, so . . . One of them finished and the other followed after. In the haze of pleasure, it was hard to distinguish between their bodies, not did Little want to consider anything so complex. They fell asleep holding each other.

Little woke in the early morning hours and found himself joined to  Granby, a bit more literally than he would have liked. And that was the day that Wellesley, now the Duke of Wellington, arrived to dispose of his Laurence Problem.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the end--until CMOTScribbler gives me an idea for a sequel!

Granby had gone to Temeraire’s pavilion as soon as he heard of Wellington’s visit. When he returned, Little saw that his lover bore bad news. 

“Surely they will not execute him?!”

“No, but it isn’t good. His sentence is commuted to transportation and labor—in New South Wales. And  Temeraire is to accompany him.”

“But that’s halfway around the world,” said Little. “What shall we do if Napoleon attacks again? Does the Admiralty think we will not have need of them both?”

“Some fool in Parliament started a fuss over what  Temeraire could do to British shipping, should he take it into his head to imitate Lien, as preposterous as that sounds. And Wellington has heard tell of Lily and Maximus rabble-rousing in the covert here, as he put it.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if he thinks Laurence put them up to it to protect himself.”

“Exactly,” said Granby. “I’m really going to miss that man. He’s grown on me over time. I remember when he first came to Laggan . . .”

“Oh, I could never forget your fits of pique about his fussy Navy ways! I thought you were going to burst every time you called him Sir those first few weeks.”

“And now I call him Will. Funny how that  turned out.”

“You’d better call me Gus for every time you call him Will,” Little said with a soft smile, “Or I shall be jealous.”

“Never fear,” said Granby. “They have given Laurence a couple of days to get his affairs in order, and then he’ll be remanded to the  _ Allegiance  _ in Sheerness Dockyards. She’s been refit to carry convicts.”

“They won’t chain him below decks, surely?”

“Not if  Temeraire has a nything to say about it.”

%%%

The day before they had said farewell to Laurence and  Temeraire . Now Little and Granby stood together at the pens, watching their dragons eat. Today was a sheep day:  Iskierka had three in the time it took  Immortalis to eat two. Little watched as the fire-breather began drinking from the trough.

“She surely does like her water,” he said.

“What? Oh, yes, she says it makes her flame hotter.” 

"That's odd."

Granby leaned toward Little and spoke quietly. “Say, I’ve been wondering, and tell me if this is rude, but don’t your Jewish priests forbid, uh, this” (here he gestured vaguely at the two of them) “the same as ours do?  Ain’t it all the same book?”

“Oh, well, yes, they do, but it’s not  exactly the same book. You've got ours and one of your own. And I’m not sure, but I think your ministers raise more of a stink about it than the rabbis do. Honestly, I worry more about my other secret. I was afraid even you might report me.”

“Never,” said Granby, looking at him intently. “Never.”

“I know.”

“Granby!”  Iskierka interrupted loudly. “I want to go flying this afternoon after my nap. Just the two of us. You never do anything with me anymore.”

“Of course, my dear. Now please hush.”

%%%

Little stood on the cliffs, staring out to sea. A week ago,  Iskierka had flown off with Granby, wearing her light harness. No one had seen them since. In his heart,  Little knew that it was highly  likely that  Iskierka had flown off to be with  Temeraire , that Granby had not deserted the Corps—and Little. Gossip around the covert held that  Iskierka wanted an egg from  Temeraire , and all knew of her previous flight from duty between Weedon and London while Napoleon held the capital, which had left Granby a prisoner, freed only at great risk by Laurence,  Tharkay , and  Temeraire .

He turned at the sound of footsteps behind him. Chenery, whom he had known since joining the Corps. Who had kept his secrets for  years.

“You miss him terribly, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“They should be putting in at Gibraltar any time now. Perhaps you’ll have a letter?”

“I hope so. Well, I really hope that they’ll make  Iskierka disembark and send them back on the next dragon transport, but if not, well, Laurence will have need of John to keep his spirits up.”

“Come on, let’s go back inside. You must keep your spirits up too.” 

%%%

When the post arrived from Gibraltar, somewhat delayed by the renewed fighting in Spain, Little was in the map room, talking to himself as he traced a route.

“Down the coast of France to Portugal, and from there to Spanish waters. Then Gibraltar. Down the west coast of Africa, likely to St. Helena with  Capetown no longer an option. Round the cape, and straight east forever and a day without land in sight until they come to Terra Australis. Or perhaps a stop in Madagascar will be necessary...”

Chenery strode into the room. “Little,” he said cheerfully. “You’ve got mail.”

_ The water is wide, I cannot get over _

_ Neither have I wings to fly _

_ Give me a boat that can carry two _

_ And both shall row, my love and I _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leviticus contains two references to a prohibition against a man “lying with a man, as with a woman.” (In contrast there are about twenty sentences prohibiting various forms of incest and multiple commandments regarding the fair treatment of day laborers, equal justice before the law for rich and poor, and leaving the remnants of your harvest in field and vineyard for the gleaners.) But it is prohibited, grouped with other Canaanite practices such as child sacrifice, incest, and sex with animals, and called an abomination. Today, the non-Orthodox denominations of Judaism allow same-sex marriage and LGBTQ clergy, with a few individual holdouts. The Orthodox community continues to grapple with the issue.


End file.
